


The Adventure Of Mr. Victor Lynch

by Cerdic519



Series: Further Adventures Of Mr. Sherlock Holmes [25]
Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Victorian, Exhibitionism, F/M, Forgery, Framing Story, Illnesses, M/M, Minor Character Death, Slow Burn, Theft, Untold Cases of Sherlock Holmes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-28
Updated: 2018-06-28
Packaged: 2019-05-29 22:18:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,725
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15082904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cerdic519/pseuds/Cerdic519
Summary: Magna Carta states that we shall deny justice to no man – and that includes criminals. Watson sees Holmes apply that principle as well as being grateful for his friend's help over his poor wife's illness.





	The Adventure Of Mr. Victor Lynch

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Chris_the_Gardener](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chris_the_Gardener/gifts).



_Introduction by Sir Sherrinford Holmes, Baronet_

In the last two months of 'Eighty-Six, Mrs. Constance Watson was gravely ill; in retrospect it was most likely the first signs of the illness which would claim her life barely a year later. My brother Sherlock generously arranged for her to spend some time recuperating in a Hampshire sanatorium, and it was whilst she was there that he and Watson stumbled across their next case together. One in which Sherlock showed that justice extended to all.

That bastard Kean has somehow gotten his trousers open and is extending something else 'to all'! I shall have to go and punish him. Excuse me.....

۩۩۩۩V♔RI۩۩۩۩

_Narration by Doctor John Hamish Watson, M.D._. 

My one fear – that my dear lady wife might not adapt to the English climate – had come to pass. Poor Constance was ill at the start of that November, and I was never more grateful to my friend Holmes who, when I told him that the doctors had recommended a stay in the country, suggested a sanatorium in Hampshire whose owners he had performed a small service for some years prior. I doubt very much that that 'small service' would have prompted them to offer me such a low rate for her time there and that Holmes doubtless funded part of the expense himself, but that was the sort of friend he was. I was truly blest to have him in my life.

The sanatorium lay in the northern part of that county, an area poorly served by public transport even in this, the Railway Age. Holmes duly called in another favour from the London & South Western Railway Company, and I was able to travel down to see Constance every weekend free of charge. And it was on one of those cold autumn weekends that saw Holmes inveigle me into a curious little case, in which I met one of the many odd characters in his most irregular life.

۩۩۩۩V♔RI۩۩۩۩

I stared in surprise at the small shop across the street from the restaurant that we were sat outside. Holmes' description of what I was looking at and the actual sight of it did not exactly match.

“It hardly looks like a crime lord's centre of operations”, I observed, looking again at the small jewellery store. “But then again, I suppose that that might be the idea.”

We had just crossed the Hampshire border to visit the Surrey town of Farnham. It had become my habit to travel down to Hartclere, the village where the sanatorium was, every Friday evening after work and then return to London late Sunday evening, but that particular Friday Holmes had called round to my house (which was mos unusual) and asked if I might assist him with a case in this small town. As it lay only a short distance from where I usually stayed for my times there I had been glad to agree. I had seen Constance during morning visiting hours and she had seemed a little better.

“'V. H. Lynch, Quality Engraver & Documentarian'”, I read. “It sounds rather pretentious to me.”

“Mr. Victor Henricus Lynch is one of the finest forgers in the land”, Holmes said calmly, “and I once managed to extricate him from the un-tender embrace of the English gaol system for a crime that, for once, he had _not_ been involved in. It was not long before I met you; curiously he is also a distant cousin of Stamford who introduced us.”

“What help does he require?” I asked.

“He claims that someone is trying to frame him”, Holmes said, “which given his line of work, makes such an event quite likely. Unfortunately it also means that the list of potential suspects would most likely fill an entire set of encyclopædias. Still, we can but try.”

It was probably silly of me, but I always felt a little warming sensation on those rare times he said 'we' rather than 'I'. I was becoming soft in my ol... my middle age.

۩۩۩۩V♔RI۩۩۩۩

After some coffee and a slice of decidedly sub-standard cake in a small café, we crossed and entered the little shop. It was as unimpressive on the inside as it had been on the outside. Three people were behind the counter, the first of whom was a smartly-dressed long-nosed man of about forty years of age with slicked back hair and, I was sorry to note, a pony-tail of all things! The young man standing next to him looked supremely bored as only today's youth can manage; I judged him to be not yet twenty and presumably the owner's son as he had the same nose but dirty blond hair (mercifully _sans_ pony-tail!). Opposite them was a girl who was perhaps slightly older; it was hard to tell as she had her back to us as she cleaned out a display cupboard.

The older man smiled in delight when he saw us.

“Mr. Holmes!” he beamed. “This is indeed a pleasure!”

He raised the partition and ushered us into the back of the shop which, to my surprise, was not the living area that I had expected. The man, who I presumed (correctly) was Mr. Victor Lynch, saw my confusion.

“My shop work takes up nearly all the space here”, he explained, “so I live in Bentley, the next station down the line towards Winchester.”

Holmes turned to me.

“Mr. Lynch here is, as I said, one of the finest forgers in this scepter'd isle”, he said with a smile. “As you can understand, his services are ever in demand, from both sides of the law, and what happened some five years back nearly proved the end of him. Or at least his freedom.”

“Lord Hawne had bought a set of ancient Hebrew scrolls from the Holy Land”, our host explained. “Thousands of years old, and yes, doctor, they were the real thing. And like all nobs he wanted to show them off. But he was afraid either someone might steal them or there might be a fire at Uffmoor, his pile up in Worcestershire, so he had me make him a set of copies. Real good ones they were; took me the best part of three months.”

“Naturally Mr. Lynch had to have the originals here to make them”, Holmes said, “and one day they suddenly vanished.”

“Where from?” I asked.

“My house, in Bentley”, the man said. “I live there with my daughter Ælfrida – you saw her in the shop – whilst my son Victor lives here. It's cramped but I need someone on site, especially with all the stuff coming and going.”

“Were they recovered?” I asked. 

“No thanks to that idiot son of mine”, our host huffed. “He had mis-spelt the address – _Up_ moor, not _Uff_ moor – and they had gone to some place up in Derbyshire. The Post Office didn't help; there was a clear return address on it but they just let it sit there in one of their offices until the police made a fuss. And that was only because Mr. Holmes here suggested such a thing.”

“Unfortunately the London element of the case fell into the hands of the obnoxious Sergeant Winter at King's Cross”, Holmes said with a frown, “so there was no help to be had there. Luckily I have some infinitely more helpful contacts amongst the local constabularies, and a search in Derby yielded the papers.”

(Sergeant Kellett Winter had recently transferred to our own Baker Street constabulary, almost within sight of 221B. Although I did not always share Holmes' low regard for the general London bobbie I was more than prepared to make an exception in his case; the pompous fellow had come round one time that I had been visiting to yell at Holmes for 'interfering' in one of his cases, and had stormed out of the room in a rage afterwards. He had however made the mistake of slamming our door which had brought upon him the wrath of Mrs. Hudson – who by a most fortunate coincidence had been cleaning a metal tray at the time.

The good thing was that she later managed to bang out all of the dents!).

“Making the copies must be a task”, I said. “I would be afraid that I would somehow mix up your work with the originals!”

The forger smiled.

“I always leave my own mark on the copy, doctor”, he explained, “so I can tell them apart if the worst happens. For example, when I was going to hand over the copy to Lord Hawne I would have shown him a small dot inside one of the 'v's that was not on the original. To the observer it would look like a random scratch-mark, but under a magnifying glass one would be able to see a miniature 'V.L.'. That way both myself and the owner can make sure that they know which is which.”

“A most sensible idea”, I said.

“My son Eddie, the idiot, managed to mix the two up one time”, he sighed. “I had had hopes that he would follow in my footsteps but he simply does not have the dedication or commitment needed.”

“And we are talking works of art”, Holmes said. “You mentioned a renewal of your troubles, sir. What has happened?”

Our host stood and crossed to a writing-desk, which he opened. From it, he extracted a small wooden box with a glass top, which he placed on the table in front of us. Inside was a frankly unremarkable and rather heavy-looking bronze pin. Holmes smiled.

“Lord Hannan?” he asked, to my evident mystification. Our host nodded.

“The Pickering Pin is Bronze Age, and at least four thousand years old”, he said. “Lord Hannan, as you say, purchased it in December, and I was asked to go up to his London house and examine it, to see if a copy could be made. It cannot be insured, because it is irreplaceable.”

“Except”, Holmes said, “that that is not it.”

I looked at him in surprise. Our host smiled.

“How did you know?” he asked.

“You did not even unlock the desk that it was in”, Holmes said. “Is this the copy that you have made?”

The forger sighed and shook his head.

“You have no idea how much I wish it was!”

۩۩۩۩V♔RI۩۩۩۩

Mr. Lynch's daughter brought us coffee and tea, and he waited for her to return to the shop before continuing. 

“I went to Brecksett House – Lord Hannan's place in Patriot Square – back in May and decided that a copy could be made, but that it would take time”, he said. “Bronze is not the sort of thing that one can acquire over the counter, after all. Fortunately amongst my many suppliers there is a man who can get his hands on such things.....”

“Who is that?” Holmes interrupted. The forger looked at him in surprise.

“Mr. Carlton, who works for the Army up in Aldershot”, he said. “He has a house there – a huge monster of a place, but then he is married with eight children – and he specializes in that sort of thing. His charges are high if not astronomical but he always comes through. You see, in this case it wasn't just getting any regular bronze. It had to be of exactly the same quality level as the original; each level of impurities makes a tiny change in the overall colour of the object.”

Holmes seemed about to ask something else, but changed his mind.

“Please continue”, he said. 

“Lord Hannan delivered the pin to me in person two weeks ago, right in the middle of all my other troubles”, the forger said. “I had obtained the bronze by then and had a rough copy that, whilst it would not have fooled anyone, needed but relatively little more work on it. Unfortunately I was out when he called; Eddie was here and checked it in. I was... uh, elsewhere all that week.”

“We do not need to know where”, Holmes said to the man's evident relief. “You returned to the shop and found that the pin was a fake?”

The forger nodded.

“Some good work”, he admitted. “The thing is, I would have staked my reputation on Lord Hannan being honest – you know as well as I do Mr. Holmes that he's the highest of High Church – but he slipped me a fake and my idiot of a son signed for it. I'm for the high jump when His Lordship wants the original back.”

Holmes pressed his long fingers together.

“Well, the solution seems obvious”, he said at last. 

We both stared at him.

“How?” I asked at last.

“I shall of course need to dispatch some telegrams to make sure that I am right”, he said, sounding vexed at having to go to so much trouble. “In fact, as Aldershot is only a little way up the line I think that we may go and call on Mr. Carlton in person. Do you have his address?”

“I do”, the forger said warily. “Do you think that the pin can be recovered?”

“I may have to use somewhat questionable methods so to do”, Holmes smiled, “but that would not be the first time, and I am certain that it will not be for the last. We shall repair to Mr. Carlton's shop in Aldershot then return here, hopefully by which time I should have had answers to my inquiries.”

۩۩۩۩V♔RI۩۩۩۩

“Who did you telegraph?” I asked curiously, as we waited for our train to Aldershot. Mr. Lynch had said that Mr. Carlton's shop was close to the station there so Holmes had opted not to take a cab.

“A criminal friend of mine”, he said. “Once we know who has the pin, he will be able to go and retrieve it from them. That is one of the advantages of applying justice rather than the law, in that it often obtains the help of some somewhat 'irregular' characters when I need it.”

“It was the son, was it not?” I asked. I was dubious about Holmes working for a forger, but I knew that the law of the land extended to everyone as did the entitlement to justice. “He signed for it. He must have made another copy whilst his father was away that week.”

“I am truly afraid that our client is indeed going to suffer a familial disappointment”, Holmes said.

Our train came in at that moment, and we entered a first-class compartment for the short journey to Aldershot.

۩۩۩۩V♔RI۩۩۩۩

The shop were were looking for was, I had decided, only 'within sight of the station' if one had a pair of binoculars to hand. Or more preferably a telescope. It was rather akin to that rather amusing advertisement I had seen in a magazine one time where a seaside bed and breakfast had been advertized as 'within a stone's throw of the sea', and people who then complained about having to walk miles to the beach were subsequently shown a catapult on the roof!

Mr. Carlton was a short, dark-haired man in his forties with an intelligent expression. Holmes only asked him a few questions and we were soon out of the shop and facing the long walk back to the station and the return to Farnham. We then went to the post office to see if his telegrams had yielded a response. He came out smiling.

“Lord Hannan has decided to sell the pin”, he said. “It is to be purchased by a Mr. Lambton who will be coming down tomorrow on his way to take ship to the United States, and wishes the item to be handed to him at the railway station. Fortunately the buyer has already had cause to examine the item when he visited Brecksett House on a previous occasion, so is confident of its provenance.”

“Might he not be afraid that he would be given the copy?” I asked. He shook his head.

“Lord Hannan will be travelling with him as far as here”, he said. “He is an expert on as well as a collector of historical artefacts. He would not be fooled by any copy, no matter how good.”

“So unless you can find the real pin before he gets here”, I said, “then poor Mr. Lynch will be devastated.”

He was indeed to be devastated. Sort of.

۩۩۩۩V♔RI۩۩۩۩

I went and visited Constance for evening visiting hours, although Sherlock had warned me that we would have an early start the following morning. Sure enough we quitted the hotel at three (he looked annoyingly awake, damn him!). He had hired two horses and we headed out of the town taking the road west. I wondered just where we were going until we reached the next village along the road. Bentley, Mr. Victor Lynch's home.

“Is he guilty after all?” I whispered. There was no-one about but the night felt strangely close around us.

Holmes shook his head and led the way into the village and turned left, presumably towards the station from the finger-post pointing that way. But we only got to the River Wey before he reined in and tied his horse to a gatepost.

“You have brought your gun?” he asked. 

“Yes”, I said, worriedly. “Do you think that I will need it.”

“Perhaps it might be for the best”, was his puzzling reply.

There was a single cottage before the road curved, and I reasoned that this had to be Mr. Lynch's cottage. Despite the early hour, there was what was definitely a candle lit in one of the downstairs rooms and the shadow of someone moving about.

“The son”, I said, frowning. Holmes shook his head.

“He sleeps over the shop”, he reminded me.

I was about to press the matter further when the light went out, and moments later the front door to the cottage slowly opened. A slim figure – definitely not our client – emerged and started down the path.

“Your journey ends here.”

Holmes's voice was terrifyingly loud in the empty night, and the person jumped before taking out what I could see in the moonlight was most definitely a gun. I had my gun in my hand but I did not need it, for there was the distinct flash of gunfire from one of the upstairs windows, the explosions shockingly loud in the dark. The figure slumped to the ground, their own gun falling with a clatter next to them. After what seemed like an age, the cottage door opened again and Mr. Lynch hurried out. In the light from the place I could see the figure lying between us, their lifeblood seeping out onto the gravel pathway.

It was Miss Ælfrida Lynch.

۩۩۩۩V♔RI۩۩۩۩

I really felt sorry for poor Mr. Lynch, even if he was a forger. Discovering that his own daughter had been prepared to let him go to jail so that she might take over his business.... no man deserved that.

“You knew all along, didn't you?” he asked dully. Holmes nodded.

“Let us say that I strongly suspected”, he said. “In both cases your son and daughter were at the scene of the crime, and they both had motive. You did not say as much, but after your earlier problems I checked it out and your late wife insisted that they be named co-heirs to your estate.”

“And she would have let me hang?” he asked.

“I am very much afraid that she would have done”, Holmes agreed. “Indeed, had I not become involved your son would most likely have suffered some fatal mishap soon afterwards, leaving her in sole charge of the business. And she is a good forger herself, something which even in in this day and age is overlooked.”

“My most important question to your friend Mr. Carlton was a simple one, and he confirmed that yes, your daughter had contacted him on your behalf about the bronze pin. What she did not tell you was that she actually requested two pins from him, one for you and one for her to create her own forgery. She knew that Lord Hannan would deliver the pin whilst you were away and that your son would not bother to fully check it, so it was easy for her to arrange an exchange before your return. And sorry though I am to say it, society is still disposed to not suspect a female of such a crime.”

“Not I!” he said fervently. “Not after this!”

“I knew that she would most likely keep the real pin in the one place that she knew neither you nor your son would venture”, Holmes said. “Whilst she was at work yesterday, a friend of mine with remarkable thieving abilities broke into your cottage and searched the place, and it only took him fifteen minutes to find the item, which is quite slow for him. Because she would not have been expecting it he went and replaced it with the second copy, the one that you made.”

Holmes took a box from his pocket and opened it. Inside was a pin that, to me, looked identical to the fake one we had seen not so long ago. It was hard to believe that such an item had existed for at least four thousand years, almost the length of Mankind's many civilizations.

“Some inquiries that I asked my brother to initiate showed that someone matching her description had been hawking the pin around possibly buyers”, Holmes said. “So I arranged that a buyer offered a large amount in return for an immediate exchange and informed you of that in her presence. She realized that exposure threatened so decided to take her prize and flee to start a new life abroad. Unfortunately for your daughter, her game ended here.”

“I have no daughter”, the forger said simply.

۩۩۩۩V♔RI۩۩۩۩

I accompanied Holmes back to the station as he wished to return to London immediately (he always seemed to believe a major crime wave would break out once his absence from the metropolis became widely known). He thanked me for my assistance, and left me to walk back to my small hotel where I might catch a few hours precious sleep before morning visiting hours.

۩۩۩۩V♔RI۩۩۩۩


End file.
